Lawrence: Yes, you have a permanent record

When we were little, If you did something [wrong] at school, a teacher might warn “This is going on your permanent record.” We envisioned a warehouse with tons of file cabinets, and in one of them, a folder with our name on it.

When we were little, If you did something [wrong] at school, a teacher might warn “This is going on your permanent record.” We envisioned a warehouse with tons of file cabinets, and in one of them, a folder with our name on it.

As we grew up, we realized there was no room; there were no file cabinets, and no folder. As teens, if we got into trouble, we knew the worst case scenario might be a juvenile record that would be sealed or destroyed when you reached 18. And besides, nobody really cared about that old stuff.

If you messed up at work, people might gossip for a time then forget about it, or you simply quit and went on to the next job. Even in the most severe case I knew of, a VP of a retail chain who had to leave New England, the guy was able to start over again down South. In other words, what happened in Vegas, generally stayed in Vegas.

The lack of a permanent record meant whatever records existed on you might be inconsistent, or they could be lost or destroyed. I knew a girl in college who later couldn’t get a high school transcript because her high school had closed and the city had misplaced the records for her whole class. My father-in-law once spent months gathering records so he could prove to the government that he had actually been born and thus apply for a passport. He had been born at home and the doctor had never reported his birth.

Things have changed. As soon as you are born now, you are foot-printed, finger-printed, and given a wrist bracelet with all sorts of data on it. You have your Social Security number before you leave the hospital.

Information about us is everywhere. Nothing stays in Vegas. Privacy is dead. Just last week I met a manager for an informational interview. He asked about my “network”: Who I know on LinkedIn, Facebook, or generally, who can help me find job opportunities. I told him the names of some authors, journalists, and broadcasters I know. As I mentioned one prominent Boston-based journalist, the guy’s eyes lit up. “I love that guy!” he declared, and proceeded to imitate the broadcaster.

He then told me how he missed a specific personality who had disappeared from the airwaves. “Could you ask your friend what happened to her?” I said sure, and later asked my friend. The answer was - I thought - rather personal. So, I wrote the manager, saying I had the answer and would call him, as I preferred not to put it in writing. To my surprise, the manager told me he had already googled the woman’s name and found out what happened to her.

I suddenly realized how the whole world knows this woman was let go from a prestigious broadcasting company. Imagine how she feels. Years ago the matter would have been private. Now it’s out there forever for all to see. How does she go about finding another job in the industry? With that information out there for all eternity, is forgiveness possible? Is her broadcasting career over?

Page 2 of 2 - I feel so sad for that woman, because, it turns out there is a permanent record. It’s not in any one room, and it’s not in a metal file cabinet. It’s in “the cloud”, out there for anyone to find, peruse, and abuse. Not just the NSA, not just employers, everyone. Unlike the old paper records, the information can’t be permanently destroyed or lost. And you can’t simply move someplace else to escape it. Almost anything and everything we say, do, or write exists for all time to potentially be used - how?

As Number 6 warned in “The Prisoner”, we are pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed and numbered. Our lives are no longer our own.